


Falling, Always Falling

by hardboiledbaby



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (Downey films)
Genre: 221B Ficlet, M/M, Presumed Dead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-20
Updated: 2014-01-20
Packaged: 2018-01-09 09:03:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1144108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hardboiledbaby/pseuds/hardboiledbaby
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There had been three men on the balcony. Now there was only one, alone with the roar of the water.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Falling, Always Falling

**Author's Note:**

> For the LJ 221b_saturday prompt: "Water." 
> 
> Set immediately after the fall in AGoS, so angsty as hell, naturally.

It happened between one breath and the next, in the space between the inhale and the exhale—

  
_When we stop breathing, we die, don't we?_  
_Yet my heart continues to beat. I am not dead._  
_**I** am not dead._  


  


There had been three men on the balcony. Now there was only one, alone with the roar of the water. One man, with one thought.

  
_He saw me. I could have helped him._  
_The two of us together against Moriarty, we could have—_  
_I could have **saved** him._  


  


Watson leans on the snow-covered balustrade and looks over the edge.

  


_Holmes. For God's sake, why?_

  


There is nothing to see in the swirling darkness below, nothing save the icy cascade that crashes down endlessly; falling, always falling, surely emptying straight into Hades itself. He strains eyes and ears against the deepening night, ignoring the painful ache of cold in his limbs, waiting for... he knows not what. Answers, perhaps. For surely Holmes knows all of them, even for the questions Watson had dared not utter.

  


_**Had** known._

  


But there will be no more answers. Reichenbach will never give up her secrets, or her dead.

Still, he cannot step away from the chasm. Only when Simza finds him there, nearly frozen, does he allow himself to be led inside. He does not look back.

**Author's Note:**

> ETA: Now with a sequel of sorts, ["Echoes and Eternity."](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1988901)


End file.
